Following the implementation of the ongoing peace process in Turkey, along with the arrival of the first members of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to the Iraqi Kurdistan Region on May 14, Kurds in Iraq have begun to pressure Turkey to release PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, who is serving a life sentence in the Turkish Imrali prison. Iraqi Kurds have launched a campaign to collect 5 million signatures (currently there are 60,000) and submit them to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Europe.

During recent years, the Iraqi Kurdistan region has witnessed numerous similar campaigns, but none of them gained the support of Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) of Iraq and of Kurdish political leaders, except for this campaign, which was signed on to by high-level figures in the KRG and its parliament.

The most prominent signatories of this campaign are KRG Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani — who is also vice-president of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) headed by Iraqi Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani — as well as the president of the KRG parliament, Arslan Baez, a senior leader in the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) headed by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani. Furthermore, 90 MPs from the KRG parliament and a number of provincial government ministers signed the petition.

Ocalan is considered the leader of the PKK’s military wing — the People's Defense Force (HPG) — and is known as “Apo” to his followers. Apo  means “uncle” in Kurdish.